Visualizing the Canadian Crime Severity Index

Michael Markieta

Posted 28 September 2011 - 11:59 PM

Michael Markieta

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Canada

Hi all,

I want to share an illustration that I have worked on the past couple of days which aims to display the varying degrees of Crime Severity in Canada. The data come from Statistics Canada, alongside other measures of crime, such as crime rate and volume.

Most importantly: what are the numbers representing? Are they per capita or total? I think it's per capita given the fact Nunavut and Northern Territories have the largest symbols. Is "Crime Index" the total of violent and non-violent?

Matthew Hampton

Posted 29 September 2011 - 12:59 PM

When I initially looked at the thumbnail of the attached image I was curious what Mercedes Benz had to do with crime?

I think radar-graphs can be effective at portraying crime severity - but I got a little confused when trying to make sense of this. You seem to have 3 indexes - but your visual indicator (circle) has 6 axes. I could understand the chart better if you differentiated the boundary-lines between indexes from the axes that indicate their relative value.

I also think you should make the key stand out a little more from the different provinces so your eye focusses on it first.

Dennis McClendon

Posted 29 September 2011 - 01:24 PM

Dennis McClendon

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United States

Good example of chartjunk. What you're showing is simple one-dimensional data (crimes per whatever by province), subdivided into violent vs. nonviolent. You could do this with graduated circles divided into two-slice pie charts, squares that work the same way, or this way, which I think better emphasizes the one-dimensional variable:

Arrange alphabetically or from most to least as you wish, or put them vertically on a simple map.

Jacques Gélinas

Posted 29 September 2011 - 02:11 PM

Jacques Gélinas

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Canada

I hope the graphic serves is purpose without much explanation.

Sorry it does not work for me.

Suggestion:I would take Dennis' bar chart arrange and spread the provinces West to East vertically, place that chart above a map of Canada and draw a line from each of the bar values to the corresponding province or territory. I would then fine tune the graphic look and feel. Simple but I think then it would work (anyway I think it would for me).